Compact reactors are needed for generating large volumes of gas from a liquid stream, for producing large volumes of liquid from a gaseous stream, and for performing a reaction between a gaseous stream and a liquid stream.

The suspended-slurry reactor presented allows the use of micron size catalyst particles in a flow-through reactor to achieve the intrinsic kinetics of the catalyst particles.  This is well suited for reactions with large mass transfer limitations in either the gas or liquid phase.  The result is high conversions with low pressure drop.  The reactor is equally applicable for liquid-liquid, gas-liquid, or gas-gas reactions.

In the case of generating a large volume of gas from a liquid stream, such as hydrogen from perhydro-N-ethylcarbazole, there is a first channel through which the liquid stream passes. It contains a layer of catalyst particles suspended in a solid slurry for generating gas from the liquid stream. The apparatus also includes a second channel through which a mixture of converted liquid and generated gas passes. A heat exchange channel heats the liquid stream, and a wicking structure located in the second channel separates the gas generated from the converted liquid.